Making her mark

She's been feted in The Guardian as a 'taste-maker' along with TV chat show host Jonathan Ross and Radio One's head of music policy, Sarita Jagpal. So just how did a Guernsey girl land such an exclusive star billing? Chris Morvan details the rise and rise of Amazon's Helen Marquis ANYONE who has ever bought CDs from Amazon.co.uk will have unwittingly benefited from the work of Guernsey's Helen Marquis.

A music account manager with the lightning-fast Internet retailer, her job involves

dealing with record companies to negotiate the artistes and CDs which Amazon is going to promote.

In this way the company can be instrumental in launching a new act.

'With James Blunt, for instance, we aimed at people who liked David Gray and Damien Rice,' Helen said. 'We did the same kind of thing with KT Tunstall.'

And, she told the Guardian: 'With Katie Melua we emailed everyone who bought Eva Cassidy and Norah Jones and said, "this is an artist you might not have heard of yet. Come to the site, listen to clips and there's a video up there you

can watch".'

Such is Helen's relationship with the record companies that some will seek her advice on songs to put out as singles. Her suggestions have resulted in successes such as Blunt's Beautiful and If You're Not The One by Daniel Bedingfield.

For the past couple of months Helen has been listening to songs by The Arctic Monkeys. 'The album's not out till January, but people have been asking for it since October. They're like The Libertines could be if they weren't so shambolic,' she said, citing a band much better known for former frontman Pete Doherty's drugs-and-Kate Moss problems than their music.

Helen's career in music-related matters began when she started writing for newspapers and magazines in Manchester. The former Ladies' College student had gained a degree in maths and French at Manchester University, followed by a master's in media studies at Manchester and the University of Burgundy in Dijon.I try to come back to Guernsey a couple of times a year,' Helen said. 'Last year I came for a school reunion. I was the only one who hadn't got married and one of only three who hadn't had children.'

In the meantime, life seems pretty good for the 34-year-old. She lives in the village of Stoke Poges, not far from Amazon's base in Slough, and, although she defends the town ('It's not as bad as people make out. It's just that it was featured in The Office'), she enjoys the peace and quiet of a small place where she knows all the neighbours.

'I lived in the centre of Manchester for 10 years,' she said. 'And I've had enough of living in cities. This is more like Guernsey in that respect.'

When not in her office, she can more often than not be found at some musical event. When I originally spoke to her in late November, she told me that the previous week she had been to the Take That launch party one night, seen Madonna at Koko (formerly the Camden Palace) the next and followed that with a gig involving The Choirboys. She was looking forward to going to the recording of a 'Later with Jools Holland' and a Blondie gig on consecutive nights. No wonder she's so hard to get hold of on the phone.

Then, a couple of weeks later, after apologising for a delay in replying to my email because she had been called to Amazon HQ in Seattle, she accompanied a selection of photographs with the note: 'Had a busy week of gigging: Coldplay, Richard Ashcroft, Foo Fighters, Duran Duran (!), Prodigy, Chemical Brothers.'

And you call that a job?I'm looking forward to Christmas and having a break from it all,' she continued. 'I'm shattered.'

Hands up all those who feel sorry for her.

Similarly, because of her position in the industry, Helen has a large CD collection. 'People hate me for this, because I get them for free,' she said. 'At the last count I had about 5,000.'

They're not all to her taste, though, and Helen is looking forward to Stoke Poges' new season of car boot sales so that she can unload some of her least favourites. 'My house looks more like a record shop. It's getting out of hand,' she said, with some of her late father's jazz collection and her mother's classical CDs vying for space with her dance music ('Chemical Brothers, LCD Sound System, Basement Jaxx, that sort of thing,') and rock (Velvet Revolver, Guns'n'Roses, AC/DC).

Highlights of the year for her as regards concerts were the Madonna gig and Robbie in Berlin ('That was pretty amazing').

Helen wouldn't like to be famous herself, though. 'I go to all these things but nobody knows who I am,' she said, before recalling being at a Coldplay gig when 'all of a sudden everybody turned round towards us and started taking photos. It was because Paul McCartney had walked in behind us, but it was horrible.'

One could think of worse things and, as the photographs here demonstrate, Helen is not exactly camera-shy, but you know what she means.